Thursday, March 26, 2009

Announcing the Divas of Daytime TV, Kassie DePaiva, Bobbie Eakes and Kathy Brier, will be at Prohibition in New York City on Sunday, April 19th at 7pm. Tickets are $15 at the door with a 2 drink minimum. Come and party with the Divas!!!

Wednesday, March 25, 2009

Flux’s 2009/10 season, “A Season of Give and Take” begins with Adam Szymkowicz’s PRETTY THEFT, a play about ballerinas, boxes and the dangers of beauty. After losing her father, Allegra falls under the wing of bad girl Suzy, only to find an unexpected friendship with Joe, an autistic savant. When things between them take a violent turn, Allegra and Suzy escape on a cross-country trip. The girls end up befriending Marco, a mysterious thief who claims he cannot be caught. Newest Flux member Angela Astle stages this unsettling play from the critically acclaimed playwright of Nerve, Food for Fish and Incendiary.

The production, produced by Flux Theatre Ensemble, will playat the Access Theater Gallery Space (380 Broadway at White Street, 4th Floor) April 23-May 17, Thursday through Saturday at 8pm and Sundays at 7pm. Tickets ($18) are available online at www.fluxtheatre.org

AdamSzymkowicz (Playwright) Adam’s plays Food For Fish and Nerve were called “fabulously weird and weirdly fabulous” and “sweet, sexy, neurotic friendly”, respectively, by the New York Times. His work has been produced throughout the U.S., and in Canada, England, The Netherlands and Lithuania. Adam’s plays have been presented or developed at such places as MCC Theater, Ars Nova, South Coast Rep, Playwright Horizons, LAByrinth Theater Company, The Lark, Julliard, Manhattan Theatre Source, Clubbed Thumb, Theatre of Note and Studio Dante. Plays include Deflowering Waldo, Open Minds, Anne, The Art Machine, Food For Fish, Hearts like Fists, Herbie, Incendiary, Bee Eater, Temporary Everything, Susan Gets Some Play and Nerve. Adam’s plays have been published by Dramatists Play Service, The New York Theater Review and in various Smith and Kraus anthologies. Adam is a two-time Lecomte du Nouy Prize winner, a member of the Dramatists Guild, the MCC Playwright’s Coalition and was a founding member of Ars Nova Play Group. Adam received his playwriting MFA from Columbia University where he was the Dean’s Fellow and, subsequently, received a Playwright’s Diploma from the Julliard School.

Angela Astle (Director) came to New York from Denver, Colorado in August 2007. She was the Venue Director for the New York International Fringe Festival 2007 where she first met Flux Theatre Ensemble. She was invited to be the associate director for Flux’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream while also associate producing Lysistrata at Gallery Players. Past directing credits include Dead Man Walking (Tim Robbins’ play based on the movie and book of the same name) and Waffles by Martha Garvey as part of the Estrogenius Festival 2008 at Manhattan Theatre Source. Waffles was selected for encore performances during the “Best of Estro Week”. Other recent directing credits include A Place for Owls by Fiona Jones, and What We Planned For by Jen Thatcher. Angela is currently the Associate Producer at New Perspectives Theatre Company.

Flux Theatre Ensemble is a group of multi-faceted theatre artists composed of playwrights, directors, actors and designers. Through continual collaboration and development of new works, re-imagined classics, and ensemble-based projects, Flux creates seasons with an underlining theme that unites work that is character-driven, globally engaged and uniquely theatrical. Flux is the proud recipient of two NYC Fringe Festival Awards. In 2007 the Village Voice Audience Favorite Award for August Schulenburg’s Riding the Bull and in 2008 for Heather Cohn’s “Outstanding Direction” of Other Bodies. nytheatre.com chose Flux Theatre Ensemble as one of their “People of the Year” for 2008 saying “This rising theatre company had a hit in the New York International Fringe Festival with Other Bodies, written by artistic director August Schulenburg, and then went on to mount the fall's most ambitious indie show, Johnna Adams's Angel Eaters Trilogy.”

"Best Underappreciated Indie Theatre Company Whose Work You Should Get Your Ass To"

New York Press

“Flux Theatre Ensemble is a smart company, unafraid of challenging material, and they make a point of engaging their audience at every turn.” nytheatre.com

“Even though we may already know that theater brings a transforming magic to our mortal world, it's a pleasure to have a production as delightful as this one to remind us.” Patrick Lee, TheaterMania (A Midsummer’s Night Dream)

“One could say it is one of the most intelligent and perceptive works to have taken the indie theater stage this year, and that would still not be doing the play justice. Nathanial Kressen, nytheatre.com (Other Bodies)

"One of the pleasures derived from attending lots of Off-Off-Broadway plays is the chance to discover new talent, and Johnna Adams' wildly ambitious…new trilogy is currently offering a bumper crop of it." Mark Peikert, Backstage (The Angel Eaters Trilogy)

Like most characters on a soap opera, Lily Winters has gone through a lot in the span of only a year. From losing the one that she loves, realizing that it wasn’t true, then finding out the guy that she’s with hasn’t been truthful with her, well, that can change a girl.

Christel Khalil, who has played Lily on The Young and the Restless off and on since 2002, realizes that all these things can really have an effect on a girl. Christel says: “She’s dealing with things that most people her age don’t deal with. That will make someone grow up and mature.”

Now that the cat is out of the bag that Chloe’s baby really is Billy’s, not Cane’s, the aftershocks can still be felt. Lily was “shocked and disgusted and hurt. I think Lily always likes to believe the best in people, and to find out that Chloe is just plain evil is pretty sad for her. Lily is just too nice to people most of the time.”

Cane and Lily are free to be with one another, but Christel believes this would have happened whether the truth about Chloe’s baby had come out or not. She explains: “I think their true love would have prevailed either way. When Cane thought that the baby was his, it didn’t matter, because he made it clear that he didn’t care about Chloe in that way, and he wanted to be with Lily. I think that no matter what, Cane and Lily would have found their way back to each other.”

So, what was the deal with Billy? Did Lily have feelings for him, or was he just a replacement for Cane while they were apart? “Lily was developing feelings for Billy. It started out as a rebound, but then she started to like him. She liked him, and she didn’t really care about what anyone said. She was doing something that she really wanted to do and didn’t worry about what other people thought.”

Even though Cane is not the biological father of Delia, he still wants his parental rights. Christel reasons: “For seven months, he thought it was his child, and he grew attached to her. Whether it was his child or not, he didn’t care; he really grew to love her. Lily understands his feelings about Delia, but she doesn’t really agree with him trying to take the baby away from Chloe.”

Behind the scenes, things are far from dramatic. In fact, it’s a veritable lovefest. Christel says: “I love working with Elizabeth (Hendrickson, ‘Chloe’), because she and I are such great friends. It’s so fun to have fighting scenes with her, because we love each other so much. Also, I miss working with my family. I never work with my family anymore; I’m always with Cane’s family. I miss working with Kristoff (St. John, ‘Neil’). And I love working with Bryton (McClure, ‘Devon’), because he and I are really good friends too.”

So, Cane and Lily are back together. Now what? “I’d like for them to have some time together where they can be happy for a while, but then, bring on the drama!” Christel offers. “Drama is always more fun — maybe have something bad happen to test their mettle as a couple.”

•Cane, Lily, Billy and Chloe have an angry stand-off over custody of Delia. Will Jill take sides?

•Neil is destroyed when Devon confronts him about sleeping with Tyra.­•After seeing Billy and Sharon together, Phyllis (Michelle Stafford, pictured) gets into a heated confrontation with Sharon. Will Phyllis keep her word to Sharon and not tell Jack?

•With Victor's help, Adam is released in his custody. Will this bring them closer together or tear them further apart?